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Law is a set of rules that are created and are enforceable by social or governmental institutions to regulate behavior, with its precise definition a matter of longstanding debate. It has been variously described as a science and as the art of justice. State-enforced laws can be made by a legislature, resulting in statutes; by the executive through decrees and regulations; or by judges' decisions, which form precedent in common law jurisdictions. An autocrat may exercise those functions within their realm. The creation of laws themselves may be influenced by a constitution, written or tacit, and the rights encoded therein. The law shapes politics, economics, history and society in various ways and also serves as a mediator of relations between people.

Legal systems vary between jurisdictions, with their differences analysed in comparative law. In civil law jurisdictions, a legislature or other central body codifies and consolidates the law. In common law systems, judges may make binding case law through precedent, although on occasion this may be overturned by a higher court or the legislature. Religious law is in use in some religious communities and states, and has historically influenced secular law.

The scope of law can be divided into two domains: public law concerns government and society, including constitutional law, administrative law, and criminal law; while private law deals with legal disputes between parties in areas such as contracts, property, torts, delicts and commercial law. This distinction is stronger in civil law countries, particularly those with a separate system of administrative courts; by contrast, the public-private law divide is less pronounced in common law jurisdictions. (Full article...)

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Selected article

The Inns of Chancery or Hospida Cancellarie were a group of buildings and legal institutions in London initially attached to the Inns of Court and used as offices for the clerks of chancery, from which they drew their name. Existing from at least 1344, the Inns gradually changed their purpose, and became both the offices and accommodation for solicitors (as the Inns of Court were to barristers) and a place of initial training for barristers.

The practice of training barristers at the Inns of Chancery had died out by 1642, and the Inns instead became dedicated associations and offices for solicitors. With the founding of the Society of Gentleman Practisers in 1739 and the Law Society of England and Wales in 1825, a single unified professional association for solicitors, the purpose of the Inns died out, and after a long period of decline the last one (Clement's Inn) was sold in 1903 and demolished in 1934. (Full article...)

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Selected biography

Sir Robert Randolph Garran GCMG KC (10 February 1867 – 11 January 1957) was an Australian lawyer who became "Australia's first public servant" – the first federal government employee after the federation of the Australian colonies. He served as the departmental secretary of the Attorney-General's Department from 1901 to 1932, and after 1916 also held the position of Solicitor-General of Australia.

Garran was born in Sydney, the son of the journalist and politician Andrew Garran. He studied arts and law at the University of Sydney and was called to the bar in 1891. Garran was a keen supporter of the federation movement, and became acquainted with leading federalists like George Reid and Edmund Barton. At the 1897–98 constitutional convention he served as secretary of the drafting committee. On 1 January 1901, Garran was chosen by Barton's caretaker government as its first employee; for a brief period, he was the only member of the Commonwealth Public Service. His first duty was to write the inaugural edition of the Commonwealth Gazette, which contained Queen Victoria's proclamation authorising the creation of a federal government.

Over the following three decades, Garran provided legal advice to ten different prime ministers, from Barton to Joseph Lyons. He was considered an early expert in Australian constitutional law, and with John Quick published an annotated edition of the constitution that became a standard reference work. Garran developed a close relationship with Billy Hughes during World War I, and accompanied him to the Imperial War Cabinet and the Paris Peace Conference. Hughes, who was simultaneously prime minister and attorney-general, appointed him to the new position of solicitor-general and delegated numerous powers and responsibilities to him. He was knighted three times for his service to the Commonwealth, in 1917, in 1920 and in 1937. (Full article...)

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Selected statute

A statute is a formal written enactment of a legislative body, a stage in the process of legislation. Typically, statutes command or prohibit something, or declare policy. Statutes are laws made by legislative bodies; they are distinguished from case law or precedent, which is decided by courts, regulations issued by government agencies, and oral or customary law.^{[better source needed]} Statutes may originate with the legislative body of a country, state or province, county, or municipality. (Full article...)

The Occupiers' Liability Act 1957 (5 & 6 Eliz. 2. c. 31) is an act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom that covers occupiers' liability. The result of the Third Report of the Law Reform Committee, the act was introduced to Parliament as the Occupiers' Liability Bill and granted royal assent on 6 June 1957, coming into force on 1 January 1958. (Full article...)

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Did you know...

... that Dutch physician Aletta Jacobs′ legal challenge to be added to the Amsterdam electoral rolls backfired, leading to a constitutional amendment granting voting rights only to men?

... that in English law, legal relations created in a social context are not considered binding?

... that in 2011, Argentinian lawyer Elsa Kelly (pictured) was appointed the first women judge on the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea?

... that the English Statute of Enrolments, believed to have been emergency legislation, contains no preamble and was drafted by the Clerk of the House of Commons rather than a legislator?

... that when Henry McCardie was a barrister, he often worked so late that his chambers were nicknamed "the lighthouse", as there was light coming from the windows?

... that the diaries of James Humphreys, the "Emperor of Porn", were used to convict 13 policemen of accepting his bribes?

... that a kidney transplantation scandal led to a 2011 amendment to the law on organ donation in India?

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Selected images

Image 1Signing of the Magna Carta
Image 2The first Supreme Court of Puerto Rico
Image 3The Langdell Library of Harvard Law School
Image 4The defendants sitting in the dock during the Nuremberg Trials
Image 5Legal systems of the world
Image 6Painting of a jury deliberating
Image 7Statue of Lady Justice holding scales
Image 8Emperor Justinian I (527–565) of the Byzantine Empire who ordered the codification of Corpus Juris Civilis.
Image 9Jawaharlal Nehru at the Allahabad High Court
Image 10Jeremy Bentham's writings influenced law for generations.
Image 11Justices of the Supreme Court of the United States as of October 2020
Image 12The Constitution of India
Image 13A courtroom in Tokyo, Japan
Image 14Chief Justice John Marshall (1755 – 1835), an American statesman and jurist who greatly influenced constitutional law'
Image 15King Hammurabi receiving the code of laws from the Mesopotamian sun god Shamash

Selected case

Case law, also used interchangeably with common law, is a law that is based on precedents, that is the judicial decisions from previous cases, rather than law based on constitutions, statutes, or regulations. Case law uses the detailed facts of a legal case that have been resolved by courts or similar tribunals. These past decisions are called "case law", or precedent. Stare decisis—a Latin phrase meaning "let the decision stand"—is the principle by which judges are bound to such past decisions, drawing on established judicial authority to formulate their positions. (Full article...)

Seneca Nation of Indians v. Christy, 162 U.S. 283 (1896), was the first litigation of aboriginal title in the United States by a tribal plaintiff in the Supreme Court of the United States since Cherokee Nation v. Georgia (1831). It was the first such litigation by an indigenous plaintiff since Fellows v. Blacksmith (1857) and its companion case of New York ex rel. Cutler v. Dibble (1858). The New York courts held that the 1788 Phelps and Gorham Purchase did not violate the Nonintercourse Act, one of the provisions of which prohibits purchases of Indian lands without the approval of the federal government, and that (even if it did) the Seneca Nation of New York was barred by the state statute of limitations from challenging the transfer of title. The U.S. Supreme Court declined to review the merits of lower court ruling because of the adequate and independent state grounds doctrine.

According to O'Toole and Tureen, "Christy is an important case in that it revived the concept that states had special powers to deal with Indian tribes within their borders."

Although the case has not been formally overruled, two Supreme Court decisions in the 1970s and 1980s have undone its effect by ruling that there is federal subject-matter jurisdiction for a federal common law cause of action for recovering possession based on the common-law doctrine of aboriginal title. Moreover, the New York courts' interpretation of the Nonintercourse Act is no longer good law. Modern federal courts hold that only Congress can ratify a conveyance of aboriginal title, and only with a clear statement, rather than implicitly. (Full article...)

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See also: Lists of case law

More Did you know (auto-generated)

... that Hartington Road Halt in Brighton, which closed after five years, was accidentally opened illegally?
... that a 1999 legal case guaranteed the right of transgender people in England and Wales to access gender reassignment surgery?
... that Bumper Pool legally changed his name to Bumper when he was 16 because of his father's childhood love for bumper pool?
... that President Ieremia Tabai of Kiribati was elected in 1978, 1982, 1983 and 1987, although his eligibility for the fourth term was subject to a legal challenge?
... that variations of the Latin legal maxim ius civile vigilantibus scriptum est have been used by American, European and Lesotho courts?
... that despite being legally available in most cases, abortion in Taiwan is still criminalized under the penal code?

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General images

The following are images from various law-related articles on Wikipedia.

Image 1Lady Justice (Latin: Justicia), symbol of the judiciary. Statue at Shelby County Courthouse, Memphis, Tennessee (from Judiciary)
Image 2Image of pages from the Decretum of Burchard of Worms, an 11th-century book of canon law (from Canon law)
Image 3The Supreme Court Building houses the Supreme Court of the United States, the highest court in the federal judiciary of the United States. (from Judiciary)
Image 4The Constitution of India is the longest written constitution for a country, containing 444 articles, 12 schedules, numerous amendments and 117,369 words (from Legal history)
Image 5"With law shall land be built", from the Code of Jutland (1241) above the Copenhagen Court House, Denmark (from Legal history)
Image 6Bentham's utilitarian theories remained dominant in law until the twentieth century. (from Jurisprudence)
Image 7Oliver Wendell Holmes was a self-styled legal realist. (from Jurisprudence)
Image 8King John of England signs the Magna Carta (from Legal history)
Image 9Corpus Iuris Civilis, 1607 (from Judiciary)
Image 10Gratian (from Judiciary)
Image 11Mill believed law should create happiness. (from Jurisprudence)
Image 12Plato (left) and Aristotle (right), a detail of The School of Athens (from Jurisprudence)
Image 13Aristotle, by Francesco Hayez (from Jurisprudence)
Image 14Thomas Aquinas was the most influential Western medieval legal scholar. (from Jurisprudence)
Image 15Philosophers of law ask "what is law, and what should it be?" (from Jurisprudence)

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